


In The Night, In The Dark

by halfmoonjune



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:13:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,607
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25621159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/halfmoonjune/pseuds/halfmoonjune
Summary: Rey wanders back to the Death Star wreckage, and finds that it’s alive.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 1
Kudos: 19





	In The Night, In The Dark

**Author's Note:**

> This story was inspired by Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House. The opening paragraph is a riff on that novel’s beautiful and famous starter, and the rest of the text was loosely inspired by the horror classic. I aligned Rey’s post-TROS journey with Eleanor Vance, hence the parallels of loneliness and missed opportunity. This is just a bit of fun, not meant to be a larger commentary on the character of Rey.

_No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. The Death Star, not sane, stood by itself against hills of ocean, holding darkness within; it had stood so for thirty years and might stand for thirty more. Within, walls continued upright, iron beams met nearly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the metal and stone of the Death Star, and whatever walked there, walked alone._

-  
It was late. Dusk settled into the tendrils of Kef Bir, staining the grassroots so the blades shone like silver. Darkness crept over the horizon and the sky whispered in shades of purple. In the distance, a hooded figure glided over the field, light as mist; so soft you had to hook your gaze to see it at all. 

Rey knew how to move without being heard. Like a snake, she slithered soundlessly to the cliff, where rock carved into slate sea. When she reached the cutoff, she stood for a moment, first to check the path behind her for intruders, and then to recall the last time fate led her here. Years and years ago now, when anything seemed possible. 

As cloud and shadow gathered in her periphery, she could smell the limp dew on the grass about her, and the memory embedded in each droplet; time caught in a flurry of jewels. There was music in the fauna of Kef Bir, and it sang stories of peace that curdled the day fire fell from the sky. The remnants gathered now in a mess of metal and machinery miles from the crag where Rey stood watching. It bore into the ocean and haunted the water and land in its wake. She trembled like she had years ago, taking in the sight of the mangled Death Star off shore. It was watching her, too. Smiling.

Rey withdrew her lightsaber and it snarled to life, bathing the air before her in balmy yellow light. Below, where water met land, a small boat sat tied to a post. It bashed against the bluff, percussion for the seabirds and devrons. She set to climbing down the cliff, her hands feeling for grooves, the lightsaber tucked carefully into her belt so that it lit the way down. Climbing for Rey was second nature. The rock recalled the ships she maneuvered on Jakku, as she scavenged for parts in their rusty bowels. She recalled also the terrible hunger that kept her moving, the only motivation in a life without love and laughter. 

She found her way to the bottom and crept softly into the boat. With the top blade of the saber, she slit the rope and eased outward. The last time she was on Kef Bir, the ocean raged and cackled fiercely. Tonight, it was perfectly still. She could see the Death Star ahead of her, over a straight line of grey water. She settled the saber—still lit—in a hook at the front of the boat and used the Force to move soundlessly ahead. Yellow light spilled into the sea. The saber shone the way like a lantern. The stars, poking meagerly through wooly clouds, left no reflection.

Summoning the Force in such dark trenches was dangerous. Rey knew this. As the boat moved forward, motored by the unseen, she felt a chill in her veins. Fear crept up her sleeve and settled in her chest. She felt her hair graying, her grip tightening. She closed her eyes and called on the Sith, who always answered—so unlike her Jedi ancestors, who came only in moments of pesky desperation. Rey was neither Sith nor Jedi, neither dark nor light; she had leveled the power within her, striking down binaries and finding the raw core of the Force. She could—for better or worse—bend it to her will. 

Tonight, she willed it to tell her the secrets on the floor of Kef Bir’s ocean. Somewhere below was the token she had come for. A relic similar to a Sith artifact. Embedded with anger and vengeance. A bit of crystal that once shone red. It belonged to the man she loved, who she still cried out for, a siren’s wail heard through the galaxy. The others moved on, settled down; smiles fossilized on their cheeks, war stories melded into myth. But Rey was stubborn. She would not let Ben Solo fade from her life. She would sculpt him from sea clay and enchant him to life if that’s what it took. But first she needed Kylo Ren’s lightsaber.

The Death Star seemed to suck her in, its blackened edifice careening over the small boat. Soon, she was at its great front door; not a door, really, but a toothless mouth of split iron beams where she would enter. She docked the boat near a tangle of debris and set back to climbing—up the wall, inside, to a disorienting split of material that mimicked an entrance. A dark hallway opened before her, long and drenched in shadow.

Rey had never felt so alone. She summoned the Sith, but they sang out only in beckoning whispers, not protecting her so much as manifesting in figments; with their feint impression, she felt only a smidgen less lonely. 

_Why am I here?_

She wondered it aloud. But she already knew. She had inside of her an insatiable desire, a hollow pit that she either starved or fed indulgently. Curiosity blossomed in this space, begged for scraps of the unknown. In the years since the Resistance prevailed and snuffed out the First Order, and peace settled back into the galaxy, Rey felt herself grow slowly more distant from what was meant to be the answer. The family she craved never came. She loved Finn and Poe and Rose and Connix, but with several closed doors between her heart’s desires and what they offered. 

“We can’t help you if you don’t let us in.” Finn’s words echoed through the grey chamber where Rey walked. A taunt. Water dripped from the ceiling. Shells of Stormtrooper armor lay scattered in the dark corners. Wire hung from the angular ceiling. She walked in a slant, the whole vehicle tipped, and dragged her fingertips against the wall. Someone else’s memories flooded through her. Imperial times. Lies of grandeur veined through the infrastructure and dripped like blood into the empty sea below. She marched with a phantom beat.

For hours, she maneuvered her way through the Death Star. The second of its kind; the ghost of a great beast. She remembered the stomach of knotted wire and fray. She traced the path elegantly, hopping from pole to pole, jimmying up a monstrous embankment that will lead, if memory served, to another dripping hallway where—on the other end—laid a throne room worn and decayed. The room where Vader died and Anakin Skywalker was reborn. And just slightly beyond, where Kylo Ren shed his demon cloak and transfigured back into the wing-splayed Ben Solo. 

_Remember—that spot, where you were slain and reborn?_

She pantomimed the motion: When she slammed Anakin’s saber into Kylo Ren’s stomach. She remembered the sensation of pierced skin: a hardened punch through surface and then a soft let. She walked down the hall and heard Ben’s voice ricocheting off the walls slimed with wet weed and barnacles. The ocean ate the Death Star. Or tried too. They might marry instead, into reef or carcass. She walked the processional, wishing it were her own, holding the double-bladed saber like a bouquet.

Ben’s voice again. Whispers. Ghostly traces of the Force trapped in plank and barrier. 

_You’re not alone._

But she was. She had been, for so long. On Tatooine, where she made base, she wore a red veil over her eyes in mourning. She slipped through the galaxy unnoticed, a specter. Maybe that’s why she felt something gentle in the Death Star’s gnarly embrace. Invisible weeds ran up her leg and tempted her to stay. Take up the throne room, or one of the abandoned quarters. 

_You are a ghost already, the Sith whisper. Stay._

She ignored them. She was on a mission of retrieval. The shadows arched and paved way for the room she was looking for. She wandered in and felt the breath let out of her, and the memories flood fresh into her bloodstream. She stood in the exact spot where Kylo Ren once stood, taunting her to join him in whatever miserable quest he was still pledged to; one even he didn’t believe. Or maybe the quest was always just her and never anything more. 

Water dripped more potently in this part of the wreckage. It gave way to more thoughts, the deeper kind. She saw the throne, Palpatine’s. Her decrepit grandfather. She pushed him from her mind. A great circular window framed her small body, too thin, covered in emerald green fabric. She felt slighter than ever before. Ashamed that she wasn’t so strong as they wanted her to be. Or maybe stronger than they knew. That’s the thing about grief: it tells lies. It twists you into something to pity when really, you are stronger than anyone knows—because you are still alive.

Then she noticed the door. Hexagonal; inherently foreboding. She stepped inside, back into the sea of mirrors she still saw in dreams. The one that mimicked, unkindly, the caves of Ahch-to. It was even darker in the depths of night. The saber reflected off of the dirty chain of mirrors. Rey waited for her, knowing she’d appear. She lowered her hood and looked around corners.

“There you are.”

Her dark twin appeared as if from nowhere. Rey flinched slightly, then smiled. “I knew I’d find you here.”

“Back again?”

The twin was her same age. Older, dented with wear. But not so old that her beauty was lost. Rey admired the bit of herself in this ghostly figure. This woman who felt as much a part of her as her swordhand. She envied her, with her bony cheeks, her ghastly smile. 

_If only. One different choice, and there I’d be._

“Welcome home.” Her smile cracked open, revealing a splay of sharp teeth.

“What?” Rey paced backyard. “No. I’m here for Kylo Ren’s lightsaber.”

“Are you certain?”

Rey hesitated. For months, she had trained with the Dathomirian witches, with their thick book of spells. She studied the dozen or so pages on resurrection. She poured bits of herself into dead slugs and vermin, perfecting her skill. But without a body, her options were limited. Talismans, however—they held a special power. Especially dark talismans. It was evil magic, and Rey wasn’t certain she was prepared to wield it. She looked into the crimson eyes of her twin and saw only herself, reflected over and over, into infinity.

_The belonging you seek is not behind you. It is ahead._

Her twin smiled even wider, until thin stripes of blood appeared on either end of her mouth. 

“Wecome home,” she said again. Rey turned and ran.

Back in the throne room, she cried out. Tears fell in great, wide droplets. She felt pitiful. She felt weak, like she had once before in this exact place; when she stabbed Kylo Ren in his stomach and lost all faith in the Force—in that belonging she still doubted.

But then something mysterious happened. A stream of odd light snuck through an unseen hall and gathered just before Rey. She looked at this peculiar, starry dust with curiosity and wonder. And then it dissolved, but not before striking her with an astute awareness. 

She was alive. She was practiced in every level of mindfulness. She was powerful, self-sufficient. She had tracked and traveled the entire galaxy. Read every book on Sith and Jedi history. She had bathed with strangers on an unnamed swamp planet in the Outer Rim. Helped build a school on Pasaana. Learned long-dead languages. She brought herself to this place, navigated the whole way herself. Should an intruder peak from the shadow, she would devastate them within seconds; she knew this.

She had doubted herself. She may have longed for her lost love, but she was not lesser for it. She looked around the throne room and was proud of herself for how little she needed bombastic displays of elegance and material power to make her feel important. She had a bag full of books back on her carrier craft. She had her lightsaber. The clothes and cloak on her back. And she had a heart ripe with passion that still ached for more—always and always.

The Death Star suddenly looked foolish. A ragged sprawl of filthy wealth. How many died to yield its construction? Thousands of souls, the Force told her when she asked. They perished just to make this thing that rotted, empty and heartless, in the ocean of a tiny moon. Forgotten, cankered to sea rocks. 

_And yet—and yet._

She walked out of the room and leapt to a port below, and then out onto a beam that connected more of the debris. Again, that smack of memory. Or was it the wind, rippling back to life and awakening the water? She needed the saber for her ritual. Or maybe just to hold again. This gathering of molted metal in the night told the story of her and Ben. Where she killed him. Where he rose. 

_I did want to take your hand. Ben’s hand._

The stars popped. Finally. Jagged splays of light peppered her way to the edge. She was gone before Ben emerged, but through the Force learned of his reemergence. How he talked to his father right here, where she stood. She could smell Han Solo’s cologne, the burn of his leather jacket, the musk of a man she barely knew but who haunted her dreams. The father figure she might have had, whose blanks she filled in with stories that might be untrue. Most people are ghosts before they even die.

She stood out on the edge, dimmed and sheathed the saber, and held her hands above the water. It began to fizzle and stir. A small geyser formed, spitting salty liquid straight at Rey’s face. She didn’t flinch. She let it bathe her. She closed her eyes and pulled with her mind, pulled and pulled without moving a muscle; her brain twisting in knots. It rooted around in the water. And finally—the saber. Kylo Ren’s saber. It zoomed from below and flew into Rey’s hand.

There she was. A woman now. Older than she cared to admit. The hilt of Kylo’s weapon in her hand. She allowed herself, briefly, to imagine what might have happened had she enacted fantasy. Her eyes, glowing opaque, on her grandfather’s throne. Ben at her side. Ruling the galaxy—not in terror, but in their explosive mutual power. Maybe they could have tamed it. Maybe the storm of retaliation that was once again brewing would not be. They could be together, alive, and the galaxy might be better off.

She ignited the blade. And thought, I will finish what you started. She didn’t know what it meant. But the flame in her heart suddenly raged. 

She forgot the ritual. The ceremony that might resurrect Ben. There was another way. She stood before the Death Star, looked up at its tremendous body—pewter against the velvet purple night—and ignited the saber. It spit and crackled with water before blaring to life, red and awake. Shadow encased her. She smiled up at the frayed globe and thought, _Home._


End file.
